The Briefing Room
General Category => Editorial/Opinion/Blogs => Topic started by: Wingnut on August 05, 2019, 06:10:20 pm
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Well reasoned piece. Don't agree with some of it, but still worth a read for a Political article.
he two mass shootings this weekend have inflamed a gun-control debate that never seems to go away and never seems to get resolved.
In the span of less than 24 hours, El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, joined a morbid parade of American cities and towns—places such as Littleton, Colorado; Virginia Beach, Virginia; San Bernardino, California; Las Vegas; and Pittsburgh—as sites of tragic, mass shootings. In the not quite eight months of 2019, there have been seven such attacks. After each one, political leaders of all stripes send their thoughts and prayers to the families of the victims, and Democrats and Republicans offer radically different responses.
Democrats decry inaction on gun regulation. They blame the National Rifle Association and the gun lobby and claim, as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi put it Sunday morning, “The Republican Senate’s continued inaction dishonors our solemn duty to protect innocent men, women and children and end this epidemic once and for all.â€
Republicans counter that gun laws aren't the problem and that mental illnesses lead to gun violence. In the immediate aftermath of mass killings, shooters frequently are branded social misfits. Thus people who know Patrick Crusius, the alleged perpetrator of the carnage in El Paso, described him as “quiet, antisocial and a bit ‘strange.’â€
https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/08/04/mass-shooting-gun-culture-227502 (https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2019/08/04/mass-shooting-gun-culture-227502)
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Article's conclusion: The left and the right must agree to move for more leftist gun control. The ratchet to socialism continues.
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Some of it is close, but marred by the authors' Lib/Prog paradigm - both are academics. What they call fear of the unknown/uncontrolled threat I would call taking responsibility for responding, if necessary, to potential threats to which government cannot promptly respond.
The old saying is that when seconds count, the police are minutes away. It isn't criticism, it's just reality. As Gilroy and Dayton showed - where police were able to respond in just one minute - quite a few people can still be murdered in that 30-60 seconds.
The academics come closer to understanding people who own firearms for self-defense than the average Prog, but they still use the tendentious "F-Word", Fear. Being prepared for potential trouble is not fear, it's being realistic and responsible.
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Article's conclusion: The left and the right must agree to move for more leftist gun control. The ratchet to socialism continues.
"Gun control" disarms law-abiding citizens. Criminals don't give a shit about "gun control" laws when they're about to commit more serious felonies like murder or robbery.
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"Gun control" disarms law-abiding citizens. Criminals don't give a shit about "gun control" laws when they're about to commit more serious felonies like murder or robbery.
Doesn't even have to be criminals. Would somebody thinking about shooting a lot of people give up because they couldn't acquire an automatic or semi-automatic rifle?
Hardly. They could do a great deal of harm with just a pump shotgun and a few pistols. And have.
I'm not against restrictions on fully automatic rifles, but the ultimate goal of the left is to disarm everybody until only the authorities have guns.
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With the NRA totally neutered in a pizzing contest right now, we better hope the dems don't take the Senate, because Trump will revert to his 'true feelings' on Gun Control and then you can kiss crucial portions of the 2A goodbye, they'll figure out the logistics of US getting there.
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The article to me reinforces what the Founders said about the Second Amendment.
It is there to inhibit the government.
Those who do not wish to are the gun grabbers.
The Founders got it right, once again.
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The article to me reinforces what the Founders said about the Second Amendment.
It is there to inhibit the government.
Those who do not wish to are the gun grabbers.
The Founders got it right, once again.
The writers of the USC knew from practical experience and understood human beings well enough generally that there are many kinds of authority with which government cannot be trusted. The Bill of Rights is wordcrafted so as to restrict government, not permit people to do certain things. It's the difference between freedom and things being tolerated.